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Subscribe to RSS Feed2003: It`s Wilko over and out!
England delivered in Sydney
The 2003 Rugby World Cup was the fifth rugby union world cup and was originally planned to be co-hosted by Australia and New Zealand.
All games were shifted to Australia following a contractual dispute over ground signage rights between the New Zealand Rugby Football Union (NZRU) and Rugby World Cup Limited.
The pre-event favourites were England and New Zealand, with France, defending champions Australia and South Africa all expected to make strong showings.
In the event, the group stage of the competition played out largely as expected, with some tension as to whether some of the "developing" nations would overtake some of the weaker major countries for the second quarter-final qualification place in each pool - in Pool A, Argentina lost to Ireland by only one point, which would otherwise have carried them into the quarter-finals in Ireland's place.
Similarly in Pool B, Fiji lost to Scotland by only two points, while Italy put up a good performance in Pool D. In Pool C, Samoa gave England a fright with an adventurous approach that allowed them to take an early lead. However, England's superior fitness, and a couple of adroit tactical subsitutions and tweaks, saw them through.
The big clashes ran mainly to form. A disappointing South Africa limped through their Pool, eventually capitulating to England and sending them to a difficult quarter-final against New Zealand.
Australia just beat Ireland by a single point to top their group, whilst Wales pushed the All Blacks to the wire after adopting an outgoing style of play with a fringe selection of players. France beat Scotland to round out the quarter-finals: France v Ireland, Australia v Scotland, South Africa v New Zealand, and England v Wales
The quarter-final stage produced the widely predicted set of semi-finalists, although England again made heavy weather of defeating a resurgent Wales. England were widely rated the world's best team, but they struggled against a Welsh side full of belief after the game against New Zealand.
France destroyed an Irish side who had gone into the match hopeful of a win, scoring 31 early points to put the game out of reach. In the other quarter-finals, a disappointing South Africa fell to New Zealand and Australia defeated the Scots.
The first semi-final produced an upset, when Australia defeated the hugely-fancied New Zealand 22-10 to become the first defending champions to reach the following tournament's final. The match was decided by an early Stirling Mortlock interception try, after a loose pass from All Blacks fly-half, Carlos Spencer. Thereafter, the Wallaby pack closed out their opposition.
The second semi-final saw France face England. The boot of Jonny Wilkinson was the difference between the two sides, with England coming out victors, but rain, and France's willingness to give away penalties to prevent tries ensured that it was a dour game. England won 24-7, but France scored the only try.
The final between Australia and England was played at Sydney's Telstra Stadium in front of a crowd of 82,957. Australia opened the scoring after they decided to run a penalty instead of kicking for touch. Lote Tuquiri beat England's right wing, Robinson, to a high cross-field kick and went over for the first try, but Elton Flatley was not able to add the conversion.
England dominated the rest of the half, opening up a 9-5 lead after Australian indiscipline gave away several penalties, but were unable to capitalise on their dominance. They nearly crossed the line on one occasion, when the Australian defence was stretched after a mistake and Ben Kay was given a potential try-scoring pass. He fumbled the ball over the line. Television replays showed Kay's reaction in four-letter words. Towards the end of the first half, England stretched their lead further. Lawrence Dallaglio made a break and popped the ball inside to Jonny Wilkinson, who drew the defence before putting Robinson away in the corner for a try. The conversion was missed, but England went in at half time leading by 14-5, a resounding riposte to the Australian media, who had questioned England's try-scoring abilities.
In the second half Australia tightened their discipline, and solid play forced mistakes from England. The game swung from end to end, with both sides having try-scoring opportunities, but neither able to take them. Australia managed to get points on the board and Elton Flatley scored two penalties to make the score 14-11 to England. In the 79th minute, Australia were putting pressure on England in their half. England had a scrum and just needed to keep hold of the ball until time elapsed. Several scrums were reset after the front rows failed to engage properly and finally, the referee, André Watson, gave a controversial penalty to Australia, despite England's scrum having dominated the rest of the game. Flatley converted it with the last kick of normal time to tie the scores at 14-14 and take it to 20 minutes' extra time.
England opened the scoring in extra time with another Wilkinson penalty, but with two and a half minutes of extra time remaining Australia were awarded another penalty, which Flatley kicked successfully. With 21 seconds left before sudden death, it came down to captain Martin Johnson and effervescent scrum-half Matt Dawson to steal 15 crucial metres off the back of a ruck, and then Dawson found Wilkinson, whose textbook drop goal won the match and with it, England's World Cup.
Competing countries: Australia, Argentina, Ireland, Romania, Namibia, France, Scotland, Fiji, USA, Japan, England, South Africa, Samoa, Uruguay, Georgia, New Zealand, Wales, Italy, Canada, Tonga.
Winners - England, 2nd - Australia, 3rd - New Zealand, 4th - France.
